Mogwai's Mind

Friday, April 29, 2005

Looking at My Options

I have been thinking a lot about the options that I have open to me at this point in my life. I have been feeling trapped as of late due to this thinking but I may have come to a resolution.

The way I figure it, I have three or four choices open to me. The first, I buy a house as soon as I can afford to. The upside to this is that I would have a house. The downside, I would be trapped in my current job for the foreseeable future. Not cool. My second option, is to move to another state and find a job, possibly teaching. The downside to this, is that I would not get a house but more likely an apartment. The upside is that I get out of Idaho and get a new job. The third option for me would be to go back to school and start on my Masters. I do want to do this someday, but I would have to keep my job, not get a house, and stay in Idaho for the next few years.

As it stands, I am leaning toward option two. I want to move I think and I want to teach. Teaching is something that I enjoyed doing everyday that I did it and I think it would stay that way. I just don't want to do it in Idaho. The pay sucks and I would either have to stay living where I am at now or get a second job. It is not that I do not like living with Demonator, I just want my own place. As for the second job thing, I want a career that I can support myself on, not one where I have to work twice as hard. I can understand getting a summer job while teaching, but having to work while I am teaching during the school year sucks and I will not do it. Therefore, I will need to get out of Idaho. I like Idaho with a few exceptions, what they pay teachers is one of them. If I taught full time, I could not support myself. Teaching will also facilitate me getting my Masters degree and that is also good.

The next step, is to figure out where I want to teach. Mr. Blue in San Jose suggested that I look there for a teaching job and I may do that. I think I will also look at the Seattle area and maybe Chicago too. All three of those are places that I could live and enjoy it. I need to look at the education certification requirements for those three states and see what I need to do to apply. I may also go back and get the last class I need for my general social studies certificate too. This changing of gears is going to take some time but I think this is at least a step in the right direction.

Monday, April 25, 2005

Strip Clubs Aren't For Me

Last night was Spyder's birthday and he wanted to go drinking. Thats always cool with me, I can usually find room in my night for an occasional White Russian but he wanted to go to a strip club called the Spearmint Rhino. I have never been to a strip club because I have never really got the point of them.

Anywho, we went to the club and I have to admit it was not as bad as I thought it was going to be. The drinks were pretty good and the club itself was very well decorated and furnished. Thankfully, there is no cover on Sundays and drinks are also cheaper. The stripping part of the club was a disappointment however.

First off, stripping in Idaho is different than other states. Idaho is one of those lame-ass Mormon run states that prohibit women to go full nude and they can only go semi-nude in clubs that do not serve alchohol. Lame. So basically, I am going to a club to see something I can see in any Victoria's Secret catalog. At this point, I am forced to ask myself, would it not be more cost effective to stay home, download some porn, and grab a beer out of my fridge? You can't touch the strippers, you can't touch people in pornos. A lapdance cost $20 for three short songs worth of getting grinded on by a total stranger that is grinding on you because you paid her $20, not because she wants to. Why pay $20 for a non-gratifying visual buffet when masturbation is free? I could never blow that kind of money on that. But I digress.

Anywho, it ended up being a pretty fun night. Spyder got pretty wasted and we got to hear some good music...and yes, we did get to see some semi-decent looking women romping around in their undies. Would I pay a cover to see this, no way but free is free.

Sunday, April 24, 2005

Of Ants and People

It has been known for a while now that ants use pheromones to communicate with each other. I am beginning to think that humans do too. I am not talking about that Axe stuff which has pheromones to help ugly guys get women, but pheromones that make large groups of people desire the same thing at the same time.

At work the other day, a guy called to see if we had a Sony Vaio laptop in stock. I told him that we did not and that we had not carried one for almost a month. After the conversation, I went back to my usual routine of looking busy until another customer approached me and asked me for the same laptop that the guy on the phone did not thirty seconds before. After telling this customer he was out of luck, five minutes later another guy approaches me and asks me for the same thing! The odd part is that the laptop in question came and went without a lot of fanfare and no one had asked for it for almost a month and then out of nowhere three people ask for it within a ten minute time span. Weird.

Another odd thing are the lesbians that come in to shop. Maybe they coordinate this but I don't think so. A day might go by when I do not see any outwardly lesbian women in the store but then one day, within the same hour almost, I will see ten or fifteen couples in the store all at once. You can ask me how do I know they are all lesbians but trust me, I know....I know.

Odd grouping of people have been happening a lot at work lately. Stuff that will sit on the shelf for weeks without selling, sell out in a matter of hours on one particular day, people asking for the same thing over and over again, people all wearing very similar clothes, people saying very similar proverbs to me in conversation, its odd. I think there is some underlying thing that controls at least how people think a little. I have noticed too many coincidences lately. It could also be that all of this stuff is on the television people are watching and sice I don't watch that much TV, I am not catching all of the latest fads and sayings, who knows.

Friday, April 22, 2005

In A Post-Apocalyptic Mood

When I was little, I was terrified that there was going to be a nuclear war and it was going to kill everyone. I was seriously driven nuts with paranoia and fear over the idea. Yes, I was a weird ten nine year old.

The way that I eventually overcame this fear was to learn about nuclear weapons and read books about them and what may happen if they were ever used in the present day. Over time, I did a one-eighty and now I am a tad crazy about post-apocalyptic stuff. I love the Fallout computer games, I love books about the many scenarios that could arise after the bombs fall, and I especially love all of the cheesy movies that have bands of scavenging nomads searching for food in the middle of a desert that was once Chicago.

Demonator was talking to me earlier about a role-playing game he found that takes place in such a world and it got me to thinking, I should just make my own post-apocalyptic rpg. Lord knows I have done more than enough research on the subject. This thought leads me to the heart of this post. A couple of lists I have compiled so that if you have a desire to read or watch post-apocalyptic books or movies, you have a place to start.

Books:

Z for Zacharia: This was a badass book that I read in junior high. Basically, I nuclear war breaks out and this girl lives alone on a farm that was spared the ravages of the war. Everything is chill until a guy in a hazmat suit shows up one day.

The Fire Brats Series: I read these when I was in elementary school or early juunior high. I think there are six books in the series but don't quote me on that. This was a cool series that I need to dig out of my parents attic and read again. Hopefully, they will be good this next time around too.

The Postman: Ok, if you watched the movie with the same name that had Kevin Costner in it, you owe it to yourself to read this book. The movie did not follow the book at all and the book is a really good read. It has a Westerny feel to it but at the same time has all of the elements of a great post-nuke read.

Movies:

A Boy and His Dog: This movie rocked. It stars Don Johnson when he was probably in his late teens and has the voice of Jason Robards. I love this movie and if you have played any of the Fallout games, they reference this film every now and then.

Miracle Mile: This was an HBO movie that I really enjoyed. Think of the movie, Titanic if it did not have an ultra lame lead actor and took place in LA right before the start of a nuclear war in the eighties or early nineties.

Six String Samurai: This movie is weird but funny. Elvis is king of the United States and when he dies, his successors must cross a radiated wasteland to try to fill his shoes in order to become the next king. Good luck finding this one and if anyone finds it on DVD and lets me know, I will worship you like a god.

Defcon 4: This film was made in 1988 and was a pretty violent action movie that lacked pretty much any plot if I remember correctly. But, it had its moments and I deserves a spot on the list.

Atomic Cafe: This movie is not a post-apocalyptic film but is actually a very very well done documentary compiled of all of the nuclear propaganda that our government put out during the Cold War. This movie is awesome and just had it 20th birthday last year. Watch this movie and be creeped out by what our government was actually saying about nuclear weapons and their effects. Its scary because it was real.

That should be a good enough list to get you started on the road to post-apocalyptic bliss. Demonator and I are going to have another nuclear movie night soon and I will update you on what movies we end up watching.

Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Another New Home

I have been busy for the past couple of days. I picked up most of my earthly possessions and moved out of Dylan's house into my buddy, Demonator's place yesterday. I have a lot of stuff and the moved took about six hours to complete. I will hopefully not have to do that again anytime in the near future.

In world news, as most of you have probably already heard, a new pope was chosen today...or I should say yesterday seeing that it is 3am now. I am not sure what I think about the cardinals' choice in picking Benedict XVI as the new pope. He is a pretty old guy at 78 and that is pushing the envelope as far as papal age limits go. I have no doubt he will do his best to serve his church, but I think someone younger may have been a wiser choice. Odds are they will be picking another pope in less than a decade but who am I to say who should and shouldn't be the earthly voice of God for millions of people?

As for computing news, I finally got the ambition to install my new Zalman HSF that I picked up while I was in California. DAMN THAT THING IS HUGE! On the upside, I have never had a computer as quiet as my big guy is right now...excellent. I have been dreading installing it but now I am glad that I did. I figured that most of my crap is in a state of upheaval right now as it is so I may as well add one more thing to the pile. Now my computer is harmonious and good.

Anywho, I am getting tired now so I think I am going to make my bed and go to sleep. I went to my parents' house today and picked up my old twin size sheets. I brought my Legend of Zelda and Super Mario Brothers sheets out of retirement. I am excited, I haven't slept in those since I was ten. :)

Sunday, April 17, 2005

Worship the Hard Drive

My computer is very fast and big. With the speed also comes the bane of any power user, heat. One of the ways I deal with the heat the my computer vents into the environment is by only having one hard drive in the system. The main drive is a 74gig Western Digital Raptor that I love very much but it is not much for storage so I have two other drives in external enclosures.

The cool part about having external drives is that you can unplug them and take them with you whenever they are deemed useful. My drive that the vast majority of my mp3s are on was not being used so I thought it would be fun to take it to work to let some people in the photo lab play with throughout the day. I have always told them I have a crazy amount of music but today they learned the true extent of my words.

It was kind of funny to watch because from the time I arrived at work to the time I left, no one in the photo lab got anything significant done as far as I could tell. They were busy sifting through the volumes of music, some of it good, some of it bad, and stood in awe of the amount of it to be had. I had one guy come up to me and tell me that it was "amazing". I guess I take my files for granted and today it hit me hard that it was not normal to have almost 700gigs of stuff lying around. Not all of that is music mind you, but I do have a lot of stuff. It was funny.

Saturday, April 16, 2005

Dinner With An Old Friend

Tonight, I went out to eat with my buddy, Kendall. He and I used to live together almost five years ago. Kendall is a good guy but he is one of those people that I do not get to hang out with as much as I would like. We met at Bitter Creek Alehouse and conversed for a couple of hours. It was nice to talk to him again. If you ever come to Boise, you must eat at the Bitter Creek Alehouse. The food there rocks as do the drinks and it is right downtown. I love that place.

Kendall is doing well and I am glad to hear it. He and I are in similar boats right now. He just broke up with his girlfriend and is also looking to buy a house in the near future. It is nice to talk to someone that can kind of grasp what I am going through at the moment. Kendall is also a good guy just to BS with in general.

In other news, my MAME download finally finished after almost 100hrs of downloading. Now I just have to come up with enough space to unrar everything. When you are short on hard drive space, 14gigs is a lot for one file. Anywho, I am going to turn my system off and give it a much deserved rest.

Friday, April 15, 2005

A Lull

Sorry I have not posted a ton lately, not a lot has been going on and even less of what has been happening is newsworthy. Those emulators I am told you I was downloading are finally getting close to being done; the 13gig package should finish today and that is the one I have been waiting on.

Work has been pretty quiet lately, I have succumbed to the fact that, in my current posistion I need my job because it is the only work that can afford me my lifestyle and give me the money to buy a house. If I started teaching, that would not even give me enough money to do that. That leads me to another point.

I have realized that if I do buy a house, I am pretty much locked into my job for the foreseable future and am locked into staying in Boise for the time as well. I think I am ok with this but I am not 100% sure. That is kind of why I am glad to be living with Demonator for a bit because that will give me time to sort out all of my finacial stuff as well as my living stuff. Part of me really wants to get a house but the other part wants to make sure I want to live in Boise for another few years. I don't know and thinking about it makes me tired.

I move into Demonator's place on Monday; I haven't even started to get stuff ready yet. I need to get boxes from work tonight and then I will probably start packing a few things up. I think I am going to have to break apart my desk into three pieces to get it into Demonator's. The place I am moving into is essentially a basement that was converted into an apartment. I like the place and the fact that it is a basement means that heating and cooling it are really cheap, I am starting to like really cheap. I figure that by living there, I will be able to free up almost an entire paycheck to pay off my one credit card bill or put toward saving up for a place of my own. My finacial stuff is coming together nicely for a change.

I went to Sin City the other night with Spyder. That was a pretty cool movie, I liked the visuals in it. It is what Sky Captain and the World of Tommorow should have been had it been directed by someone with experience.

Anywho, that is pretty much a summary of the past week. I will post more if anything cool happens.

Tuesday, April 12, 2005

All Hail The Mighty Emulator!

I love emulators! I have had a good set of NES and SNES emulators and roms for a while but I must say, the past few days have taken the emulator cake for me. I was looking on one of my favorite Bittorrent sites the other day and I found a complete set of roms for MAME and for the N64. I was in heaven.

The MAME set is huge. For those of you unfamiliar with emulation, basically a program is run that tricks your computer into thinking it is something it isn't like a Sega Genesis or Atari 2600. Just about every old console gaming system has an emulator made for it and most of the new ones do too but they do not work nearly as well as the older ones. Anywho, MAME is the emulator of choice for stand-up arcade games like Street Fighter II and King of Fighters. That kind of game. Anywho, I am getting damned near every arcade game out there. Joy to the world! I love these things mainly because I can play all of the older games that I used to play when I was little on my computer in all of their glory. A lot of the games I like, I can't find in arcades anymore so emulators make perfect sense. The other nice part is that I can play these on my modded XBox as well.

In other news, I went to Jim's today who will from here on out be called Demonator, and helped him clean up the apartment. I think moving there will be a good move and it will definitely help me save money. Rent and utilities are almost nothing. This will be good, I will get to pay off my car and American Express quickly and be able to amass a windfall of cash in which to put a down payment on a house toward the end of summer. At least this is my plan. Sometimes I can get carried away with spending but I think living with my pal Demonator will help this. I am on my way to financial freedom.

Sunday, April 10, 2005

Can You Hear Me Now

For the past couple of days, my voice has been fading in and out. I think I have a tad of a flu bug or something and the only thing it has really affected has been my voice. As I am typing this, I am hoarse but my voice has definitely returned for the time being. The people at work have loved me for two reasons over the past couple of days. The first being that I sound kind of like Napoleon Dynamite and people have been making me say lines from the movie and getting a big kick out of it. "Tina, eat your food. EAT YOUR FRICKIN' FOOD!!" Secondly, when people call me on the radio or on the phone, they can barely make out my voice and what they do hear sounds like the gutteral mutterings of a man who has smoked Lucky Strikes for over a decade. If you take Napoleon Dynamite and the Marlboro Man and put them in a bed and wait nine months, that is kind of what I have been sounding like for a couple of days.

Tommorow, I will still be a tad hoarse but people should at least be able to understand me. In other news, I am moving in with my friend Jim a week from Monday. Rent is cheaper there and I do not know how long I was going to be able to keep staying with Dylan, as he was starting to get low on funds and was contemplating moving to a cheaper location. Either way, I hope that this is the last move until I can find a place of my own. As much as I like spending quality time with good friends, I want a house of my own. And I do not want to move for a while after that. I have been feeling way too nomadic as of late and I have way too much crap to be a nomad. It is not like I can just pack up my yurt and sheep and move all of the time, if I wanted to do that I would go to Mongolia. Mogwai Khan.

Friday, April 08, 2005

The Cat Returns!

As I groggily stumbled out of my bedroom this morning, there Dylan's cat was, starring at me through the window of the patio door. I was so excited to see that she had come back. When I let her in she went straight for her food and then came to me for attention. It was a good start to the day.

I kind of wigged out last night and I apologize for that. Every once in a while I just do that. I went to visit Totoro after I got done with the previous post and that helped me quite a bit. These days I have become very attached to cats and I miss mine. It is odd how much I missed Dylan's cat when she wasn't around too. Maybe I just miss companionship whether it comes from the two legged or four legged kind.

Waiting

I am stupid. Stupid.

Dylan's cat has not come back for a while and I am concerned. Usually, we let her out and she plays outside for a little bit and then she ususally comes back to the door and paws on it and we let her in. The whole process usually doesn't take long and she comes back quickly but tonight she has not come back. I was concerned when I cam home from work because I couldn't find her and when Dylan came home he said he had let her out before he left and that she had only been out for about an hour. He said this about two hours ago. So the cat has been gone a total of three hours almost and I am worried. Actually, to say that I am worried is an understatement, I am beside myself. I am obsessively going to the back door to see if she is back if I hear even the slightest noise. Dylan did not seem to care a whole lot and so maybe he knows her better than I do but it does not stop me from being bothered about it.

This whole evening can pretty much sum up Mushi and I right now and maybe that is why it bugs me so bad. The cat wanted out and so it was let out. It has not come back yet and I keep waiting for it to do so but in the back of my mind I am thinking to myself that it never will come back. But I still keep waiting. And waiting.

I am beginning to think I have depression issues...or maybe a better way to put it is that I am starting to come to grips with the fact that I have depression issues and that they have been there for a while. I am starting to think that I need to talk to someone. This is an option I have been weighing in my head for a few days now. Maybe talking to someone will help. I just think to myself that maybe if I wait a bit things will get better on their own and there is no need.

The other reason I am so bugged by the whole cat thing is that I really like her. She is a good kitty and keeps me company during the days that I am around the house. She kind of fills in for my real cat, Totoro. I miss Totoro too. Fortunately, when I get my own place, Toto is going to come live with me. That is if he still likes me by the time I get my new place. We will see.

Anywho, I am going to go do something else to get my mind off Dylan's cat...maybe I will stop by and see Totoro. Regardless, I am going to leave the patio and porch lights on just in case the cat decides to come back.

If I were a stranger reading this post, I would be thinking to myself that the guy that wrote it was crazy. Maybe.

Thursday, April 07, 2005

Damn You CableOne

The past couple of days have sucked. I finally get my VGA cooler working; I had to rip the wiring off of a fan and use it instead of the wiring that the cooler came with. Once the system was up and running, the internet goes down on me. It has been down for the past two days! This morning, I checked to see if it was up again and to my joy it was. Mushi was very angry about this disruption because her schooling requires her to be on the internet and to check her email frequently so for her, this downtime was torturous. I think all of Boise's cable internet subscribers were out in the cold for a bit. It is one downside to living in a city like Boise, you only have one cable provider and one DSL provider so if you don't like either of them, you are screwed.

In other news, I started back to work yesterday. Joy. It was an easy day but it was still work. I have the same shift today and tomorrow. I do not totally mind going back to work because I was starting to get a tad stir crazy and needed something to do toward the end of the vacation. I also need the money. With the next paycheck I get and the bonus I got last Friday, I will hopefully be able to pay off my car. That will be one less bill I have to deal with.

Tuesday, April 05, 2005

Finally Home

Okay, I have been home for a couple of days but I have not been able to post due to the fact that my computer has not had a video card. I was installing that Silencer 5 VGA cooler and I had to mess with the wiring of the cooler in order to make it compatible with my card. Anywho, now that that is done my card is smoking fast and cool. I ran ATI Tool on it and maxed out my core speed at 598mhz before artifacting started to occur. I figure that is a good speed seeing that the default speed for the card is 500mhz and the default speed for X850s is 550mhz. I like my video card.

Anywho, the drive back to Boise was long and boring. I left San Jose at almost 2am Sunday morning and did not get back to Boise until around 5pm. I did take an hour long nap on the side of the road but that was pretty much all of the sleep I had for the day. It was a long day.

Overall, I enjoyed my vacation. It is too bad that I had to return from it. San Jose had excellent weather and it is almost 20 degrees cooler here. Oh well, I can always go back again later. Now that I am back for a bit, I will be moving in with my friend Jim. The rent is lower at his place and Dylan is thinking of moving back into his mom's house. This is a move that will save both of us quite a bit of money seeing that the house we are in now takes a decent amount of cash to run. Hopefully, I will not be with Jim for long and I will be in my own house before the end of the summer. I want a place to settle so I can begin to move on with my life. What I am doing now is tiresome.

I start back to work tomorrow and for the first time in a while I think I am ok with that. I need money and something to do. When I go on vacations, I get out of my rythym which is a good thing but after a bit I like having a little bit more oder to my day. Anywho, I am going to fiddle with my video card a bit more and see if I can find a good speed to keep it at for a while.

Saturday, April 02, 2005

The Pope Has Died

As you have probably already heard, Pope John Paul II died today. I am not Catholic but the history and traditions of the Catholic church have always intrigued me. The part that I am most interested in is happening in the upsoming days, the conclave. When the conclave begins, all of the cardinals of the church will gather in the Sistine Chapel and elect a new pope.

Usually the conclave lasts a matter of days, with black plumes of smoke rising from the chapel to indicate that a vote has not yielded a pope and a single white plume of smoke signaling to the world that a new pope has been chosen. I think the reason I am so interested in these events stems from the fact that while we will all live through quite a few Presidential elections, there will only be two or three Papal elections in our lifespans. The choosing of a new pope is a rather uncommon occurrence.

Anywho, John Paul II has gone to a better place and now is a time of change within the Catholic church.

The Last Day

Today is my last day in California, tomorrow I will head back to Idaho. It has been a good vacation, I definitely feel better about everything now than I did when I left Idaho. Ben and Kristi aka Mr. and Ms. Blue, have been excellent hosts and have gone out of their way to make my stay with them as pleasant as possible. Thanks you two!

It is going to suck going back to Idaho for the sole reason that it is going to be between 15 and 25 degrees colder there than here. I walked out of the apartment today and was embraced by the smell of newly blossomed vegitation and the warming California sun. As I type this, it is about 75 degrees outside with an ever so slight breeze. When I do back to Idaho, it is going to be cloudy, probably rainy, and 50 degrees. That sucks.

In a while, Mr. and Ms. Blue and I are going to go to the San Jose Art Museum and check out the Blobjects exhibit. This was talked about in last month's Wired magazine. Afterwards, we are going over to a friend of Mr. Blue's and having a Neto's sausage BBQ. That should be tasty.

Tonight, I will pack up my car once again and get to bed early. I am hoping to start out around 7am tomorrow. I am going to lose an hour once I head towards Idaho and I do not want to get there horribly late tomorrow. This has been a really nice trip and I have already started to plan my next one; I am thinking New Orleans in the Fall. I just need to make sure my financial situation is copacetic first.